Ath. The friendship which arises from contraries is horrible andcoarse, and has often no tie of communion; but that which, arises fromlikeness is gentle, and has a tie of communion which lasts throughlife. As to the mixed sort which is made up of them both, there is,first of all, a in determining what he who is possessed by thisthird love desires; moreover, he is drawn different ways, and is indoubt between the two principles; the one exhorting him to enjoy thebeauty of youth, and the other forbidding him. For the one is alover of the body, and hungers after beauty, like ripe fruit, andwould fain satisfy himself without any regard to the character ofthe beloved; the other holds the desire of the body to be asecondary matter, and looking rather than loving and with his souldesiring the soul of the other in a becoming manner, regards thesatisfaction of the bodily love as wantonness; he reverences andrespects temperance and courage and magnanimity and wisdom, and wishesto live chastely with the chaste object of his affection. Now the sortof love which is made up of the other two is that which we havedescribed as the third. Seeing then that there are these three sortsof love, ought the law to prohibit and forbid them all to existamong us? Is it not rather clear that we should wish to have in thestate the love which is of virtue and which desires the belovedyouth to be the best possible; and the other two, if possible, weshould hinder? What do you say, friend Megillus?
Megillus. I think, Stranger, that you are perfectly right in whatyou have been now saying.
Ath. I knew well, my friend, that I should obtain your assent, whichI accept, and therefore have no need to analyse your custom anyfurther. Cleinias shall be prevailed upon to give me his assent atsome other time. Enough of this; and now let us proceed to the laws.
Meg. Very good.
Ath. Upon reflection I see a way of imposing the law, which, inone respect, is easy, but, in another, is of the utmost difficulty.
Meg. What do you mean?
Ath. We are all aware that most men, in spite of their lawlessnatures, are very strictly and precisely restrained from intercoursewith the fair, and this is not at all against their will, but entirelywith their will.
Meg. When do you mean?
Ath. When any one has a brother or sister who is fair; and about ason or daughter the same unwritten law holds, and is a most perfectsafeguard, so that no open or secret connection ever takes placebetween them. Nor does the thought of such a thing ever enter at allinto the minds of most of them.
Meg. Very true.
Ath. Does not a little word extinguish all pleasures of that sort?
Meg. What word?
Ath. The declaration that they are unholy, hated of God, and mostinfamous; and is not the reason of this that no one has ever saidthe opposite, but every one from his earliest childhood has heardmen speaking in the same manner about them always and everywhere,whether in comedy or in the graver language of tragedy? When thepoet introduces on the stage a Thyestes or an Oedipus, or a Macareushaving secret intercourse with his sister, he represents him, whenfound out, ready to kill himself as the penalty of his sin.
Meg. You are very right in saying that tradition, if no breath ofopposition ever assails it, has a marvellous power.
Ath. Am I not also right in saying that the legislator who wantsto master any of the passions which master man may easily know howto subdue them? He will consecrate the tradition of their evilcharacter among all, slaves and freemen, women and children,throughout the city:-that will be the surest foundation of the lawwhich he can make.
Meg. Yes; but will he ever succeed in making all mankind use thesame language about them?
Ath. A good objection; but was I not just now saying that I had away to make men use natural love and abstain from unnatural, notintentionally destroying the seeds of human increase, or sowing themin stony places, in which they will take no root; and that I wouldcommand them to abstain too from any female field of increase in whichthat which is sown is not likely to grow? Now if a law to thiseffect could only be made perpetual, and gain an authority such asalready prevents intercourse of parents and children-such a law,extending to other sensual desires, and conquering them, would bethe source of ten thousand blessings. For, in the first place,moderation is the appointment of nature, and deters men from allfrenzy and madness of love, and from all adulteries and immoderate useof meats and drinks, and makes them good friends to their own wives.
And innumerable other benefits would result if such a could only beenforced. I can imagine some lusty youth who is standing by, andwho, on hearing this enactment, declares in scurrilous terms that weare making foolish and impossible laws, and fills the world with hisoutcry. And therefore I said that I knew a way of enacting andperpetuating such a law, which was very easy in one respect, but inanother most difficult. There is no difficulty in seeing that such alaw is possible, and in what way; for, as I was saying, theordinance once consecrated would master the soul of, every man, andterrify him into obedience. But matters have now come to such a passthat even then the desired result seems as if it could not beattained, just as the continuance of an entire state in the practiceof common meals is also deemed impossible. And although this latter ispartly disproven by the fact of their existence among you, stilleven in your cities the common meals of women would be regarded asunnatural and impossible. I was thinking of the rebelliousness ofthe human heart when I said that the permanent establishment ofthese things is very difficult.
Meg. Very true.
Ath. Shall I try and find some sort of persuasive argument whichwill prove to you that such enactments are possible, and not beyondhuman nature?
Cle. By all means.
Ath. Is a man more likely to abstain from the pleasures of loveand to do what he is bidden about them, when his body is in a goodcondition, or when he is in an ill condition, and out of training?
Cle. He will be far more temperate when he is in training.